Nero

"Never could take those legends too literally. But I do know that Sparda had a heart. A heart that could love another person. A human! And that is what you lack!"- Nero, Devil May Cry 4

Nero is the main character of the fourth installment of the Devil May Cry franchise. Little about him is known, but apparently, he was raised in the city of Fortuna as an orphan and taken in by Kyrie and Credo since childhood and grew into young adulthood together. Nero's actual origin still remains unknown but Sanctus makes multiple references to Nero being "a descendant with Sparda's blood". Nero is a sardonic character and doesn't like to be messed around with. He wields the Blue Rose, Red Queen, and Devil Bringer. Nero is a Holy Knight in the Order of the Sword, a religious order that worships Sparda and fights to protect the world from demons. He performs "special jobs" for the Order. Nero's rebellious nature leads to the Order preferring for him to work alone, and Nero actually prefers to act as a lone wolf. Kyrie is the childhood friend of Nero as well as a singer during the Order's ceremonies. He and Kyrie both fall in love some point prior to the beginning of the game and this love plays a major part during the events of Devil May Cry 4.

Plot
At the game's beginning, Nero manages to barely make it to one of Kyrie's performances on time after dealing with a group of demons. He leaves her a gift and then prepares to leave, having grown tired of listening to Sanctus's preaching. Just before he can though, Dante bursts in through the ceiling during a prayer and proceeds to kill Sanctus, the leader of the Order. Credo, head of the Order's knights, and brother of Kyrie, along with a battalion of knights confront Dante, but are completely outmatched. Nero manages to step in just in time, sporting his iconic two-legged kick into Dante's face, just before the Devil Hunter can approach Kyrie and Credo. The two fight, and again, Dante comes out on top, shrugging off everything Nero throws at him. He comments that they're the same, and points out to Nero that the knights Dante had slain were in fact demons. Confused, Nero watches as Dante flees the scene and so starts his quest to seek him out.

Shortly after Dante flees, Nero is given his sword (Red Queen) by Kyrie as Credo's request. The three leave the arena, only to discover the city's citizens being attacked by demons. While Kyrie and Credo lead the survivors back to headquarters, Nero fights off the remaining demons. While heading to Fortune Castle, where witnesses reported to Credo, Dante had fled to. After leaving Fortuna, Nero fights Berial, a large demon and ruler of the fire hell.

After defeating Berial, Nero makes his way to Fortuna Castle where he meets Gloria, a new member of the Order. While in Fortuna Castle he fights Bael, a large toad demon, who's specialty is ice. Nero also meets Agnus, the Order's Chief Alchemist in the castle basement. Agnus reveals that he created the hell gates and also is harboring demonic to transform humans into angels in what is called the Ascension ceremony, although they are actually becoming demonic with angelic appearances. Agnus also reveals that using this power, Sanctus wants to rule the world. Agnus has Nero nearly killed by his Angelos, during which Nero dramatically unleashes his Devil Trigger, gaining a phantom-like appearance. Under this form, Nero managed to resurrect Yamato, the sword of Dante's brother, Vergil.

Nero heads toward headquarters, believing Credo must know more of the events occurring than he reveals. He crosses the bridge which heads into a cave concealed by the waterfall and finds himself in a forest. He runs into Dante, but the encounter is very brief. Nero fights countless demons within the forest and eventually kills Echidna, a dragon-like demon who treats the forest as her children (the demons are, at least). Nero eventually finds the Headquarters where he finds Credo at the entrance. Credo attacks Nero under Sanctus's orders although Nero is reluctant knowing that to kill Credo would upset Kyrie. Nero is victorious but Kyrie sees Nero and his demonic arm, mistaking that he was trying to kill Credo (reverted to his human appearance). Agnus captures Kyrie, revealing Sanctus's desire to use her to get to Nero, Credo is furious but Agnus flies away with Kyrie. Credo puts aside his fight with Nero, for the time being.

While in the Headquarters Nero fights Agnus but fails to kill him and rescue Kyrie. He continues on however and runs into Dante again, who demands that he give him Yamato. Nero refuses and the two fight. Despite Nero wielding the Yamato, Dante is able to easily beat him, though he refuses to kill him. Although Dante wants his brother's sword back, he allows Nero to keep it for now, seeing as how he needs it. Nero reveals his name to Dante and leaves.

Nero later finds Sanctus next to a giant statue called the Savior (resembling Sparda), Nero fights Sanctus, defeating him easily, though he can not out power the Savior or kill Sanctus who willingly uses Kyrie to prevent Nero from doing so. Sanctus steals the Yamato from Nero and kills Credo with it after being attacked by him due to his anger at his Holiness's betrayal. Dante and Trish (who was Gloria) come and witness the powering of the Savior. Nero is absorbed into the heart of the Savior for power. Credo asks Dante one last request, to save Kyrie and Nero. At this point in the game the player assumes control of Dante, since this has nothing to do with Nero, we will skip forward in the story.

Dante, who retrieved Yamato and destroyed all the Hell Gates, faces off against the Savior and thrusts Yamato into the core of the statue, awakening Nero and allowing him to escape the heart he was imprisoned in. After completing a number of trail within the Savior, Nero faces against Sanctus. Nero defeats Sanctus who is angered due to the Sparda (the sword of the Dark Knight) refusing to give Sanctus the power to kill Nero. Nero explains to Sanctus that although Sparda was a demon, and although he does not believe the stories as literally as he should, he says the Sparda did have a heart, one that could love another person, the one thing that Sanctus lacks, who's only desire is power. Nero saves Kyrie and kills Sanctus, they later escape the Savior.

Although it seems the end has come, the Savior transforms into the form of the False Savior, taking on Sanctus's appearance. Nero agrees to fight in Dante's stead. At this moment, Nero seems to apologize to God for despising him for cursing Nero to his fate as a half-demon. Nero destroys the False Savior and accepts who he is as a demon, deciding that although he is a demon, he is not evil. He meets up with Dante who exchange thanks and a friendship. Nero tries to return Yamato back to Dante, but he refuses giving it to Nero. Nero asks Dante if they'll meet again and he waves, showing that it is hopeful. Kyrie joins Nero and is happy that the end has come. Nero returns his necklace to her and they nearly kiss, but are interuppted by demons. Nero fights them off while Kyrie waits, agreeing to kiss him after.

Appearance


Nero wears a long blue coat with the Order of the Sword's insignia sewn into both shoulders. He also wears a red zip-up hoodie/vest underneath this coat, and what appears to be a black cotton t-shirt beneath that. Nero wears two rings on his human hand: one on his index finger that has the emblem of the Order of the Sword on its face, and another on his ring finger which has a rose design on its face, identical to the designs on his belt buckle, coat clasp, and coat buttons. He has white hair and blue eyes, similar to Dante and Vergil.

In early concept designs, Nero instead wore a double-breasted coat and white overcoat similar to Credo's.

Devil May Cry 4 emphasizes that Nero has some sort of connection with Sparda, due to the connection he has with the Yamato and his alleged place in the Sparda bloodline. However, the details of this have yet to be confirmed by Capcom.

Gameplay


Nero has the ability to use Devil Bringer, his right arm resembling that of a devil's, a unique ability for him that allows him to snatch far away enemies and perform supernatural feats of strength. When in use, a disembodied version of the arm briefly appears and imitates the action of Nero. The size of the arm differs on how much focus and energy he puts into it, as displayed during the final battle against False Savior where the arm grows to an enormous size to pulverize the statue's face. In addition, the Devil Bringer can absorb objects or weapons of demonic origin and use the abilities they possess at his leisure. The Devil Bringer also appears to have a connection to Yamato as it was the only thing capable of repairing the Devil Arm completely, which Agnus was unable to do. Unfortunately he does not gain new weapons apart from Yamato. Nero's taunts in a similar sarcastic fashion to Dante; one taunt involves him bowing mockingly and asking, "Shall we dance?", while another has him aiming the Blue Rose at his enemies and saying "Bang!" instead of shooting.

Nero seems to share the demonic ability of being able to instantly heal wounds that would seem fatal to normal humans. This is most explicitly shown in Mission 6 when Nero is impaled by a Bianco Angelo and a Gladius. When the two weapons are removed, he is able to stand the wound, though worn down, and after his Devil Trigger deactivates it has healed completely hence the Devil Triggers ability to heal while it's activated..

Nero does seem to be able to fight enemies on a standard level without Red Queen, Blue Rose, and the Devil Bringer. One of his attacks has him do a drop kick on an enemy if he's running fast enough, and the Taunt button is pressed. Nero also demonstrated this in the Prologue of Mission 1 as he was able to take down a large number of Scarecrows without any of his weapons by his side (Though he was using a Scarecrows blade as a weapon during this fight).

Nero appears to possess some skill with the Yamato as he is seen firing waves of energy from the blade on several occasions, though this may be a passive ability of Yamato itself which can cut enemies without having the blade to make contact at all. When not in use, the Yamato is assimilated into the Devil Bringer until Nero is ready to use it again.

Nero does possess a Devil Trigger, in which a blue, spectral demon manifests behind him wielding the Yamato; this demon somewhat resembles the Devil Trigger of Vergil due to the "sheath" on its left arm. Nero himself acquires a blue aura, burning red eyes, and a deeper, echoing voice. The spectar mimics Neros movements but strangely enough when Nero uses Buster on Angelo Agnus while he's stabbing Gladius into Agnus the spectar is slowly drawing its hand towards Yamato before slicing like Nero does with Showdown. When Nero swings his sword the spectar demon swings Yamato doing a right hand version of Nero's attack. Some of Nero's techniques with the Yamato, usable only in Devil Trigger, allow him to wield the sword itself. In Devil Trigger Nero has two special attacks. The first is called "Showdown" in which Nero unleashes a barrage of slashes with the Yamato as well as some with the Red Queen. After the technique is over he will either say "Ashes to ashes", or "Dust to Dust". His second attack is called "Maximum Bet". Nero combines Yamato and Red Queen and then slashes twice in an X form sending a fast, blue energy blade in the form of an X at the enemy. The attack can be charged up for more power and a bigger blast but doing this will slow the blast down. The major drawback of these two attacks are that they leave Nero completely wide open for attack because Nero is chargijng up energy before unleashing these attacks. For these moves to be successful they must be done at the right time. It is unknown if the Nero's Devil Trigger will continue to manifest as a detached specter, or will become more similar to other characters' Devil Triggers and allow him to physically become the demon itself.

Trivia

 * The character is voiced and motion captured by Johnny Yong Bosch who played the role of Adam Park, the second Black Ranger in the American adaptation of the Super Sentai franchise, Power Rangers. Similarly, Daniel Southworth who played as Vergil also played the role of a Power Ranger; the Quantom Ranger in Power Rangers Time Force.
 * Nero is Italian for "Black".


 * It was announced by Kobayashi that the "private female citizen" traveling with Nero mentioned in the manual was actually Kyrie (as announced by Kobayashi).
 * La Vita Nuova, the final scenes name with Nero and Kyrie, is named after a series of poems written by Dante Alighieri about his endless, admiring love for Beatrice.
 * In earlier publicity art and screenshots for DMC4, Nero's Devil Bringer originally had a golden glow before it was changed to blue.
 * In the entire DMC series Nero is the only playable character who uses his sword in his left hand since he uses his Devil Bringer for the right hand. Similar to this are the bosses Rudra and Berial as they too are left handed with their swords.